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The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. ---- It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills; and all the nations shall flow to it, and many peoples shall come, and say: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.” For the teaching shall go out of Zion, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide disputes for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. Isaiah 2: 1-4 |
On Monday evening 4 August 2014 many Jersey folk were in the Royal Square to mark the one-hundredth anniversary of the start of the First World War at 11 p.m. that night. The words in bold above were carefully and clearly read to us.
Why? And how did these words originally come to be written? In fact, do they have any meaning at all for me today?
The book of Isaiah is part of the national archives of Israel, of the Jews. Isaiah’s book opens with these words: "The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah." King Uzziah reigned in Jerusalem from 767 BC. King Hezekiah’s reign there ended in 687 BC.
Those years were marked by awful wars in that whole area. In 722 BC the northern part of Israel was conquered by the troops of the King of Assyria. 21 years later, in 701 BC the Assyrians, under Sennacherib, destroyed all 46 walled towns and all villages in the area surrounding Jerusalem. Jerusalem alone survived its siege. (As mentioned in the Royal Square, only 21 years also separated WW1 and WW2.)
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‘War is the slaughter-house of mankind and the hell of this present world.’ (John Trapp, Bible commentator, 1601-1669)
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Living as he did in these awful times, Isaiah saw something better, something positive, something eternal. He saw the end of war itself: "they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore." Many people who endured WW1 hoped it would be the war to end all wars. They were mistaken. Many people around the world are today still learning, studying, planning how to wage war. Was Isaiah also mistaken?
Isaiah was looking ahead – way beyond his century – to the time of "the latter days when the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills." Only then will war cease across the whole earth. Only when that “mountain of the house of the LORD” is “established as the highest of the mountains”.
What does that mean? At the very least it means that wars will one day cease when the realm of the LORD God is willingly adopted by all nations and peoples. At that time all nations will be saying: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.”
Why would nations and peoples ever do that? It’s unrealistic, isn’t it? But Isaiah wrote: “It shall come to pass.” And it was read to us all last Monday night. What kind of force, what kind of weapon, what kind of power, what kind of army, what kind of leader will bring this about – on earth? |
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‘What peace can they have who are not at peace with God?’ (Matthew Henry, Bible commentator, 1662-1714)
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Later in the book which bears his name, Isaiah recorded the kind of person who would be the world leader who would bring this about.
Here are his ancient words describing that person when he “in the latter days” would come to earth: “He was despised and rejected— a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief. We turned our backs on him and looked the other way. He was despised, and we did not care. Yet it was our weaknesses he carried; it was our sorrows that weighed him down. And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins! But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed.… He had done no wrong and had never deceived anyone. … He was counted among the rebels. He bore the sins of many and interceded for rebels. "
Yes, Isaiah saw Jesus of Nazareth seven hundred years before he came. And he saw the peace with God – and with one another – that he would bring.
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